Conference: 2024 Flow and Transport in Permeable Media Gordon Research Conferences and Gordon Research Seminar

This proposal supports student and early career scientists’ attendance at the 21st biennial Gordon Research Conference (GRC) on the Flow and Transport in Permeable Media and the 7th Gordon Research Seminar (GRS). The funds will be used to reduce the cost of conference attendance by young investigators and underrepresented minorities with the aim of supporting the next generation of researchers and increasing the diversity of the attendees. Many natural and engineered materials are porous and central to important societal challenges, such as the energy transition and the response of natural systems to human use and climate change. Improving our understanding of porous media is therefore essential to a wide range of disciplines and solving a broad spectrum of societal challenges. The GRC and GRS will expose students and early career scientists to these societally relevant problems and build new professional connections to support future solutions. The 2024 GRC and GRS conferences will present cutting-edge research on the role of porous media in the Energy Transition and Climate Change. The conference will expose students and early career scientists to sessions dedicated to crucial energy technologies such as geothermal energy, natural hydrogen accumulations, and geological carbon storage. The conference will bring together experts from academia and industry to identify challenges and possible solutions for building new collaborations in these areas. A second set of sessions will discuss the role of subsurface geology (i.e., porous media) in the response of natural systems to climate change. One session will cover the response of the intersection of atmosphere, soil, and bedrock. Another emerging subject is the hydrologic response of ice sheets to surface melting. The third session is dedicated to large-scale hydrogeological dynamics and how they can be integrated into land surface and climate models. The conference will bring together experts from academia and international research institutes in these areas. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.